A Successful Restaurant Strategy
Courtesy of the Library of Congress
Our WPA food series eating while poor looks at restaurant entrepreneur Emil Wagner. During the Great Depression, Wagner left his job at the Astor Hotel in New York City as a waiter and opened a restaurant at 215 Park Row. Within a fortnight, he revolutionized the restaurant business featuring tremendous quantities of food at unheard-of low prices. A large bowl of steaming soup, a thick, sizzling juicy steak smothered with onions, and French fries on the side, coffee and three rolls all for twenty-five cents. How did Wagner make a profit? Today some have turned to less menu items, others pivoting from a brick and mortar space to a food truck. What food businesses have you scene survive and thrive during our current economic down turn?
